<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<title>Drowned Saint by mintedstar (forevermint)</title>
<style type="text/css">

body { background-color: #ffffff; }
.CI {
text-align:center;
margin-top:0px;
margin-bottom:0px;
padding:0px;
}
.center   {text-align: center;}
.cover    {text-align: center;}
.full     {width: 100%; }
.quarter  {width: 25%; }
.smcap    {font-variant: small-caps;}
.u        {text-decoration: underline;}
.bold     {font-weight: bold;}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25167079">Drowned Saint</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/forevermint/pseuds/mintedstar'>mintedstar (forevermint)</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Sinner's Coffin [3]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Norse Mythology - Neil Gaiman, Warriors - Erin Hunter</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Gen</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-07-09</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-07-09</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-05 05:34:01</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,524</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25167079</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/forevermint/pseuds/mintedstar</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Sinner's Coffin [3]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1823164</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Drowned Saint</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Water choked at the tom as he paddled toward the rocky outcropping in the middle of the lake. It was a bit of a struggle for the orange tom to pull his bulky body from the depths of the clinging, dark water, but after a second he managed it. <br/>"You're late," hissed the slim she-cat, tail resting on the rock that the tom had pulled himself onto. She wasn't looking at him. Instead, she was looking out at the water. The tom shook out his fur.<br/>"Heh," he said. "What was he going to do while I was gone? Drown?"<br/>The she-cat took her eyes off the place on the lake she was looking at and turned to glare at the tom. Her eyes, gold and hard, made the tom uncomfortable. His ears pressed against his head.<br/>"I'm sorry mother," he muttered.<br/>"There will come a time when he won't drown and he won't live and you know that as well as I do, Thunderstep. Now, unless you intend to take up your position in my place, I would suggest you keep a civil tongue in your head."<br/>Thunderstep dipped his head. "My apologies." His face still almost held a smile, but he seemed to have gotten it under his control. <br/>He slowly climbed the outcropping until he was standing beside his mother. He looked down at the black water of the lake, breath catching in his throat.<br/>It was dark, that was the only way to describe the water. It reflected the stars and the dark shadow of mountains around them perfectly, like a mirror and lifeless as the desert. It was decorated with small, lapping waves after Thunderstep had paddled through it, but that was already stilling. Now he could look out at the cold water and it was only marred by four things. This rock outcropping and two others, spaced at even angles near the center of the lake. Thunderstep was looking toward the center of the lake, however. On the surface, or rather just under it, there was the grey and silver blotch which was far too large to be that of a star. Thunderstep's breath caught in his throat. He'd seen this only once before. When that 'blotch' was dragged out into the middle of the lake and forced under the water.<br/>"Has Fallingpetal not been back?" he asked softly.<br/>His mother's gaze shifted and looked off in the direction of one of the other spires of rock. Thunderstep's eyes followed. The she-cat didn't have the sight of Farsight, but it wasn't hard to pick out the white and brown she-cat who was hurrying down the face of the stone.<br/>Her paws hit the water a second later and she sunk almost completely under the surface of the water. Her small body glided through the water, struggling to stay afloat. Thunderstep stiffened, wishing he could assist her. But his mother's tail was braced against him, keeping him steady.<br/>It took several seconds for Fallingpetal to reach the silver blotch under the water. It was only then that she dived under the water, her body sinking beneath the surface. Her body supported the tom who was pushed out of the water, his tabby head breaking the surface. Thunderstep couldn't completely see the details of the tom, but he remembered him well enough to know what he would do.<br/>His body, limp with death, would revitalize. He wasn't a true god - he didn't need to live and die by the same rules of the Tree that applied to the gods and goddesses of the mountains and forest. He lived by his own rules. He regained life from ice and fire and whatever other deeply hidden facets of the Tree that Thunderstep couldn't begin to understand. He breathed for them, water choking from his lungs as the she-cat supported him enough for him to breathe. Thunderstep didn't think that the tom had ever shivered before. The cold had never harmed him before and fear wasn't something which affected him. <br/>But this was different. Even at this distance, Thunderstep could see the silver tom's shoulders shaking. He could hardly move. Whatever enchantment that Thunderstep's father had placed on him, he could hardly move. He could only breathe and shake just a little in the minutes or so of the life he had. There was no way that Fallingpetal could ever support him above the water long enough to completely ease him from the discomfort of life and death, over and over again.<br/>And then Thunderstep saw Fallingpetal's legs move slower and the tom slowly sunk beneath the water again. His muzzle lifted as if trying to catch the last vestige of air in his lungs. Thunderstep could imagine the terror in those ice-blue eyes as he disappeared under the water again. Small ripples drifted away from him, thrashes that weren't enough to keep him above the water. Fallingpetal's head appeared above the water, gasping for breath. Her movements were slow and weak. They hadn't been strong enough to support the tom for more than a couple breaths for years now. She needed to rest. They all knew it. Or she would be stuck in the same trap as him. She had in the past, only to be fished out by the ravens, servants of Thunderstep's father, and left out to dry on the rocks.<br/>Thunderstep wondered if permanent limbo beneath the water wouldn't have been a more fitting punishment.<br/>"Why are we here?" he hissed. It had been so much easier to forget this place didn't exist when he didn't have to be reminded of it. He glared with distaste down at the lake.<br/>That had been his friend. Had been his friend. It had been so long since he could have actually called the silver tabby something kind. Fallingpetal, however, had his sympathy. He saw no reason why she should have been punished. It was a punishment that should never have been hers.<br/>"To check that he is still here, of course," murmured his mother. "You know as well as I do that when the spell weakens, he'll come for us."<br/>Thunderstep shivered. Even after everything that the tom had done, would it really have been a surprise to anyone? <br/>"That will be at the end, mother," said Thunderstep. It was meant to reassure.<br/>"Yes," she said, golden eyes narrowing. "And when will that be? The end could be at any time. I, for one, am not going to wait and see when Silverspeaker has dared cast a shadow over our dens. I would sooner wait for the hounds of Ragnarok to tear me to pieces than I would wait to be backstabbed by that creature again."<br/>Thunderstep's fur bristled. He glanced back down at the cats below him. Fallingpetal was struggling toward another of the spires of rock again. Not theirs. He was glad. He would rather not talk to her, not after everything that had happened.<br/>"And what would you do if the bounds weaken, mother?" he asked. "You know how this story ends. He will die in fire and ice, just like the rest of us. The world tree's branches will crumble and the magic keeping all of us alive will crumble with it."<br/>His mother stood, her pelt bristling. It made her look like a gold halo was surrounding her. This was the queen that Thunderstep never spoke down to. She had a figure of denial and posture that made him think that it would be a bad idea to go against her.<br/>"I don't want to risk it," she hissed. "He'll find a way. He always finds a way back to us."<br/>Thunderstep bristled. "You can't honestly believe that, can you?"<br/>But his mother shook her head.<br/>"Your father knows what he's doing. But I can't help thinking that he's somehow plotting while he's under there."<br/>"He's *dead*," Thunderstep breathed. "Speaking from my wars with the creatures of shadows and ice, the dead don't think about the living. Certainly not the ones who are stuck as he is."<br/>His words seemed to calm his mother a little. She glanced out at the dark water.<br/>"If you are sure, Thunderstep. But am I wrong? Tell me I'm wrong. Does he not look a little stronger now than he did all those years ago?"<br/>Thunderstep looked back at the water, holding his breath. While he and his mother had been talking, Fallingpetal had returned to Silverspeaker and he was once again supported out of the water. Thunderstep tried to pick out any of his features from this distance, but it was a struggle. It took a second of him watching before his eyes found those blue eyes.<br/>His pelt spiked. He knew they had to be safe over here. Even if Silverspeaker could see them, there was no way that he could do anything. But the fact that he could focus at all unnerved Thunderstep. Or was he just imagining it?<br/>He forced his fur to lie flat again and looked at his mother.<br/>"It's fine, Mother. He is as trapped as he ever was."<br/>He had to be ...</p>
  </div></div>
</body>
</html>